Students and instructors from the Heavy Equipment College of America (HEC) assembled and tested a 110-ton lattice boom crawler crane at the school campus in Stonecrest, Georgia.
The school’s newly acquired Manitowoc MLC100-1 crane arrived at its field-testing site where 16 instructors and staff conducted the operation, which focused on safety measures to ensure the proper assembly crawler crane.
According to HEC president/CEO Bob Albano, students from the Lattice, Swing Cab, Fixed Cab and Signal & Rigging courses participated, as well as students taking classes focused on heavy equipment.
“We had a great day outside at our field site demonstrating assembly procedures and safety protocols to students,” Albano said in a prepared statement. “The comments we heard on the MLC100-1 were along the lines of ‘awesome machine,’ and that it has ‘unbelievable control systems.’ We’re certainly pleased to be able to have students train on such an innovative crane with some of the latest technology in the industry.”
Instructors were also pleased with the Manitowoc crawler crane. They described the machine as “easy to operate and teach on,” according to Albano.
The MLC100-1 purchase was part of a two-unit acquisition: The other crane went to HEC’s Oklahoma City location. The move is part of the school’s strategy to have students practice on modern cranes currently being used by contractors nationwide, giving them real-world experience.
“These two new Manitowoc MLC100-1 cranes will reinforce to prospective students that crane operator jobs nowadays are highly specialized and often quite different from outdated perceptions of the industry,” Albano said.
HEC is the only Department of Education accredited school for crane operation. The school purchased the two MLC100-1 cranes from longtime Manitowoc dealer H&E Equipment Services, headquartered in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Source: Manitowoc